Shattenkirk To the Caps: Good Trade?

At around 10:00 last night Caps’ fans Facebook groups were buzzing with the news of Kevin Shattenkirk being traded to the Capitals from the St. Louis Blues. Shattenkirk is a depth defenseman which was one of our greatest needs as we get closer to the playoff games. This isn’t the first important Blues player we’ve picked up, previously our very own Tj Oshie is a former Blues player. We unfortunately lost a first round draft pick in 2017, a conditional second round in 2018, Zach Sanford, and Brad Malone for Shattenkirk and gained former Hershey goalie Pheonix Copley, who will once again play with the Bears. This is a high price for Shattenkirk and Copley, and my big question is: is it worth it?

Shattenkirk has 11 goals and 31 assists this season with the Blues and a career of 66 goals and 218 assists. That would seem bad if he wasn’t a defenseman; however, he has nearly doubled the amount of goals of our highest scoring defenseman, John Carlson, has racked up. While +/- is a very outdated stat he has a -11 stat however his team has altogether a -3.33 +/- average vs our average of +16.7. While his +/- isn’t glowing his Corsi is above many Caps defenseman including, Chorney (32), Alzner (103), Schmidt (122), Orpik (127), and Orlov (157). Corsi represents the amount of shots on goal, saved shots, and missed shots all added together Shattenkirk has a corsi of 162.

How’s Sanford though? Sanford has scored two goals and gotten one assist in 26 NHL games with the Caps. he has light up the net 11 times and gotten 5 assists in 25 games down at Hershey. He is a very good prospect and could have an amazing future; however, he is still a rookie. I don’t know how much he could have done for us because right now the only way you can tell is the probabilities.I think this is a good trade. We have many good offense man and some good defense but we needed the depth that he will add. We’ll see tonight against the Rangers. But anyway what do you think guys think?